Review: The Ferryman

The Ferryman by Justin Cronin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a 4-star review which is an accurate reflection of my experience with this book.

It started out as a 5-star review that was closer to 4.5 stars but rounded up. This book is really well written!

But then I started thinking about the elements that made it a 4.5-star review and realized that 4 stars were more accurate.

It is impossible to review this book without spoiling it. The plot is multi-layered to the point where a discussion of one layer is insufficient and any links to another layer are too revealing.

So....go read the book. It is a great read that is well worth the price of admission despite my criticisms, below.

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Spoilers are ahead. And once spoiled, this book is ruined. You have been warned.

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Humanity has spoiled the Earth. A potential new home for humanity has been identified. An intrepid team has developed a propulsion system that will take a large human contingent to this planet. The trip will take hundreds of years. The same team has also developed a method for getting those humans to their new home - essentially putting them in a sort of state where they live in a shared dream and interact via some sort of computer network.

In the dream, a person "lives" for a long period of time before being reset. At reset, their dream memories are wiped and they return to society as an older teen with some basic understanding of language and manners but little comprehension of the world. They are adopted by an "older" couple, attend school, marry, have careers, and eventually succumb to time and board a ferry that will take them to be "reset".

This is the general framework of the world. The story involves one character attempting (and eventually succeeding) to break free from the dream.

We eventually learn that our main character led the team that developed this interstellar ship, selected the colonists, and developed the unique dream system that allowed the colonists to survive the trip. His wife was pivotal in the development of the dream system and acted as a dreaming controller that permitted the system to function.

As a side note, he and his wife lose a daughter to an awful tragedy before the starship leaves Earth. This fact and the many interpersonal relationships that unfold provide a thoroughly interesting exploration of the subconscious mind.

It turns out that upon arrival, the primary doctor is awakened to find that the destination planet is coming out of an ice age and is barely habitable. The doctor wakes one of the primary funders of the journey who decides that it is better (for this rich guy) if everyone just sleeps for an eternity so that he can continue his dream existence with lots of servants and power.

Why doesn't the doctor wake the person in charge of the expedition? This poor decision is vaguely explained. Oopsie.

So what are the elements that caused me to downgrade my review? Lots of little stuff.

The first one was the use of sex as a reset button. There is a computer/robot/AI (it isn't clear) that manages the transition from being old to being young again. In the book, this system presents as an attractive female doctor. There isn't any indication that the system presents as something different to different people.

When our hero is sent off to be reset, he encounters the good doctor. He is dressed in a robe. She has him get on an examination table for what is ostensibly going to be a medical exam. She then strips and hops onboard for a little cowgirl action. It is the sort of weird thing that happens in dreams.

How do the women "reset"? Is it the same doctor/system? The book doesn't present other genders as an option for the system. Men and women generally approach sex differently. I find it hard to believe that the women in the dream system would readily respond to "surprise sex" with a doctor in a medical setting.

The second element is a "blame it all on the rich" mentality. There are obligatory genuflections towards wealth inequality, blaming the rich for despoiling the planet, overconsumption, barely veiled blaming of capitalism, blah, blah, blah. The typical leftist hymnal.

People want to own homes. They want more leisure time created by using modern conveniences. If we could somehow miracle "the rich" into the middle class, we would not eliminate the market demand for new/better goods. It is that market activity that creates the wealth needed for average people...not "the rich"...to improve the quality of their lives.

If...and that word is doing a lot of heavy lifting...humanity is despoiling the Earth, then it is the average human that is responsible. Not the Eeville "rich".

There is no option that creates sufficient economic growth to lift the vast majority of humanity out of poverty without also creating opportunities for income inequality. Make no mistake. Socialism/communism create poverty. Capitalism creates wealth that lifts people out of poverty. Nor was there ever an option to get to where we are today without using fossil fuels at some point.

Regarding the "If" mentioned above, in the book, there are a series of ecological calamities going on. One, in particular, involves a wildfire sweeping from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. That sort of climate alarmism simply isn't justified by any rational reading of climate science.

A third element is "the dream" in which they all live. The waking colonists quickly become pissed as they figure out that our main character devised a computer simulation where they ended up being the slaves (or near slaves) to the wealthy people that funded the development of the colony program and ship. Our main character expresses the thought that he made them dream slaves for their own good. That the experience of being dream slaves would provide a useful motivation once they landed on the new planet.

Within the story, the colonists all suddenly realize that it was only a dream and it didn't matter.

Our main character sends them down to the new planet without most of the rich people. The "useful" rich people get to stay. Our main character then redesigns the dream simulation to effectively teach those rich people a lesson and they begin the long flight back to a (hopefully recovered) Earth.

So the dream didn't matter except when it did. They were screening colonists for the right skills and attitudes. He had the ability to design the dream simulation to "teach lessons" at the start. And at no point was there any consideration for screening out rich people that were abusive, or using the power to use the dream simulation to "teach lessons" on the way to the new planet. It was always in the main character's plan to not let the rich join the rest of the colonists on the new planet.

Essentially, there is one person with the power to make life-and-death decisions for thousands of human survivors. Those kinds of systems rarely end well. But in this case, an all wise and all powerful Gary Stu rides to the rescue.

At this point, it seems a minor nitpick to point out that the author stereotypes "rich people" in a way that would never be tolerated by any other group.

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I can survive any story that uses a couple of disagreeable tropes. But throwing in the entire kitchen complete with the kitchen sink is a bit much.

This is the sort of book that the New York publishing world adores. I found it quite entertaining and well worth the effort despite my complaints.

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